Taste of Desire
by Dragon Elexus
Summary: Homeworld is coming, with an armada that will destroy them. Sapphire can see no way out of it. Except one.


**Author's Note:** This pieced is paired with the work, " _For Destruction_ ". Both pieces were co-authored by LadyRavenEye. A link to her AO3 page, and the other piece, can be found on my profile.

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 **Taste of Desire**

Rose Quartz was worried.

Well, Rose Quartz was laughing even more than usual, and humming under her breath, and Sapphire had now counted _three times_ she had briefly touched her strange pearl in front of normal soldiers—but all this she knew to mean that Rose Quartz was worried.

And this was before the official start of the war council meeting in which Sapphire would have to deliver her news. The future was grim. Her future vision showed one clear path: Homeworld's second wave would arrive within a few Earth days. The Crystal Gems would be outnumbered and outgunned, and they were going to lose.

Sapphire had taken to sleeping just to stop from Seeing her friends crushed and scattered across the battlefield. Once, they were separated by arbitrary class lines on Homeworld. Now, they were united under the Rose banner and fighting together for Earth. Emeralds and topazes, carnelians and even jaspers. And rubies. And Ruby.

Rose Quartz was at the war meeting of course, and her pearl, an aquamarine the soldiers called Dead Eye, and a citrine-and-amethyst fusion, Ametrine. The only Ametrine. They—no, she—still sent shivers through Sapphire's form, even though Rose Quartz said it was all right. On Earth, Gems could choose who they wanted to be. Supposing any of them survived.

And Ruby. On Homeworld, Ruby would have been pre-construction demolitions at best, and cannon fodder at worst. She was one of the first Gems to pledge herself to the newly named Rose Quartz. Ruby never tired of telling the story of how _she_ had been the reason the mighty Pink Diamond poofed, making it sound at first like it was an epic battle, then revealing that Rose had simply gotten caught pushing her out of the way of a landslide.

 _Still_ , Ruby would say with a voice like polished gravel, _It was pretty swell to get touched by a Diamond_. That part always made Sapphire feel a little less frozen, for at least a little while.

They were gathered in a small, cramped cave, damp with sea mist. The Gem sky arenas, the ocean spires, the proud, polished temples- their rebel group had been pushed out of all of them. This tiny cave, with nothing but a few dull crystals as ornamentation, was where they had been forced to make base. There'd been talk of building a proper Temple there, eventually, as well as reclaiming other Gem land. Now, the chance of any of that happening was dim indeed.

The Crystal Gems clustered close together in their cave-made-war-chamber, but Ruby was standing farthest away from her. Still, Sapphire could feel her heat radiating from across the council circle. She allowed herself to See what would happen if she met Ruby's eyes, so her face was already prepared to hide her own shy smile in the face of Ruby's wider one.

Sapphire felt braver.

She spoke her piece as concisely as she could, keeping her voice even and emotionless. She could See no paths whereby the Crystal Gems would win. Everyone in the cave would be destroyed, either on the battlefield or on Homeworld. Some would be experimented on; others shattered, their shards used for some project or other. The rest would be thrown into an incinerator for routine recycling. The silence deepened into something that felt like despair.

Rose Quartz broke the silence with a low chuckle.

By Sapphire's estimation, it was a terribly inappropriate reaction considering the gravity of the situation. Except that it was Rose Quartz, and whatever she did tended to come off and grandiose and gentle all at once. If anyone else had laughed, Sapphire suspected that it would have caused agitation, even anger. As it was, the chuckle seemed to spark some sort of hope in the other rebels. They were certain that their defector Diamond still had some glorious trick hidden up her figurative sleeve. Maybe they were even right.

"Well," she said. "Sapphire. It would seem—"

"You're sure there are _no_ options you haven't explored?" Rose's pearl barked out. "Something you haven't thought of?" Ah, but she **had** grown brave. Then again, of course she had; instead of being outraged at the pearl's outbursts like any Diamond should be, Rose Quartz not only accepted them, but seemed to actively encourage them.

"I'm sure," Sapphire lied. Next to her, Ametrine hissed with displeasure. "But there have been times in the past when Rose has helped me See tactical possibilities I had not considered before."

Rose looked at Sapphire, then moved her eyes from Gem to Gem until they rested on Ruby. Sapphire did not need future vision to know what she was going to suggest next.

"Have you thought," Rose said gently. "About a garnet?"

A garnet. Rubies were common, sapphires were rare, and garnets were simply dangerous. Masters of the elements, ruthless in combat, and if a garnet was so unfortunate as to inherit their sapphire's future vision—well, Homeworld wasn't entirely wrong about fusion, even if Rose Quartz disagreed. She would weave sweet tales about how fusion was just 'misunderstood'- that it was the ultimate connection between Gems- but that didn't mean it couldn't be treacherous or terrible. From what the stories- _legends_ \- told, garnets were made of ashes, and crushed Gems.

Sapphire willed herself to look at Ruby. Her open face reflected Sapphire's inner thoughts: apprehension, fear, dread—but also, a deep trust. That was to be expected—anyone in this circle—anyone in this _army_ —would die for the other.

Ruby looked from her, to Rose Quartz, face set. "Well, from the sounds of it, we don't have much choice," she said. "If Sapphire is willing, so am I."

Ruby's tone was frank and plain, as was her expression. Sapphire could detect no desire, and she told herself that she was not upset about this.

Had she _thought_ about fusing with Ruby? Sometimes, she thought about tearing her eye out of her body, the temptation to See what their fusion would be like was so strong. Fuse with Ruby, who used to be just _some_ ruby, some twerpy grunt with an asymmetrical gem and a temper worse than Dead Eye's? Fuse with Ruby, who could make her laugh even when the weight of the future felt heavy enough to crush her? Fuse with Ruby, with whom she had never spent so much as a breath of time completely alone, who was generous and brazen and wild and good?

The truth was, sometimes, the future didn't show you what you wanted to see. When Sapphire was a handful of hundred years old, that might have bothered her. Now she was more ice than light.

Sapphire Saw shards of red gem glitter in Earth's sunlight, and knew that she had already made her decision.

She closed her eye, and opened it to the future. .


End file.
